StagePlayer+ streaming service for the performing arts
February 10, 2021
Player+, the direct-to-consumer premium content aggregator and Easel TV, a SaaS provider of OTT streaming video services, are partnering to launch StagePlayer+, a new streaming service for the performing arts.
StagePlayer+ is a streaming platform for theatres, concert venues, producers, rights holders, festival organisers, agencies and performers staging live or recorded online events, or with a catalogue of content.
Providing a virtual venue for selling and streaming live and on-demand events, StagePlayer+ is a fully managed, operational service including ticketing, payments and customer care. Content is secured by Hollywood standard digital rights.
Joe Foster, CEO of Easel TV said, “During the first lockdown we were asked to enable the streaming of Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s Fleabag Live through Soho Theatre’s streaming video service. As a result of that show, we were contacted by theatre & production companies seeking to provide similar services. We knew we could help; we operate SaaS streaming services for the likes of Curzon Cinemas and NBCUniversal, but it wasn’t possible to provide every Performing Arts entity with its own service and many did not have sufficient content. So we partnered with Player+, applied for and were awarded, an Innovate UK grant to contribute towards the building of a streaming service for the Performing Arts; the result is StagePlayer+”.
Richard Jacobs, CEO and Co-Founder of Player+ said, “Following the recent soft-launch of NewsPlayer+, we are excited to be developing StagePlayer+, the next in our series of genre-based OTT services offering a wide range of fresh content supported by enhanced discovery, enabling increased footfall and revenues for content partners. Both Player+ and Easel TV are confident that by removing obstacles for theatres, production companies and event organisers, and enabling them to offer audiences their premium content through a professional service on a wide range of big screen devices, StagePlayer+ will become the go-to destination for Performing Arts.”
StagePlayer+ will be available over the coming months to users around the world through a wide range of large screen Connected TV devices and platforms. The service uniquely brings audiences of all content partners together in a single destination, generating significantly greater collective audiences on a collaborative basis, and creating a focal point easily discoverable by viewer.